Method and apparatus for drying sheet material.



0. AMINTON.

METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DRYING SHEET MATERIAL.

APPLICATION FILED ocT. 6, I9l4.

1,147,809.. A PatentedJuly27,1915.

2 SHEETSSHEET 1.

0. MINTON. METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DRYING SHEET MATERIAL.

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WITNESSES OGDEN MINTON, OF BROOKLYN, NEW YORK.

METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DRYING SHEET MATERIAL.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented July 27-, 1915.

Application filed October 6, 1914;. Serial No. 865,29.

To all 107mm it may concern:

Be it known that I, OGDEN MrN'roN, a citizen of the United States, and a resident of Brooklyn, in the county of Kings and State of New York, (whose post-oliice address is 186 Washington Park, Brooklyn, New York,) have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Methods and Apparatus for Drying Sheet Material, of which the following is a specification, taken in connection with the accompanying drawing, which forms a part of the same.

My invention relates to method and apparatus for dryingsheet material.

More particularly it relates to paper making, and in that art it particularly relates to the process and apparatus for making high grade paper of a superior quality and at a material reduction in cost. It is to be under-- stood, however, that it is equally adapted for use in the manufacture of cheaper paper;

In the accompanying drawing showing an illustrative embodiment of one form of my apparatus wherein my improved method may be carried out, the same numerals refer to similar parts in the several figures.

Figu 'e 1 is a vertical section through my vacuu chamber; Fig. 2 is a diagrammatic viewin longitudinal vertical section through a portion of a paper making machine and through my vacuum chamber to show the operation of my improved method; Fig. 3 is a diagrammatic vertical section through a portion of a paper making machine showing two of my vacuum chambers one of them being employed in place of the ordinary plurality of drying drums which are shown diagrammatically in Fig. 2.

In the illustrative embodiment of my apparatus and with more particular reference to Fig. 2, 1 is a web of paper shown passing from the wet end 2 of a paper making machine under the couch roll 3 and through the press rolls 4. 4 over the guide rolls 5, 5 and around the drying drums 6, 6 which are heated by steam passing to their interior in any suitable manner, usually through their trunnions. For purposes of illustration I have shown four drying drums 6. In many paper machines the number of these drying drums run up to thirty. In the drawing I have assumed that four such drums will dry the web of paper 1 which will then pass into the sizing vat 7 under the roll 8 and through the squeeze rolls, 9, 9 emerging from the sizing vat at the point 10. The portion of the apparatus which I have up to this time described is the ordinary onein commercial use and is no part of my invention. In the present commercial manufacture the web of sheetpaper is then cut at the point 10 into sheets and stacked by. a layboy. About twenty of these sheets are taken at a time and placed over a pole and hung in drying lofts where they are allowed to dry slowly in a temperature of about. 120 F. This drying takes about forty-eight hours. My improved method covers treatin the paper upon its exit from the sizing vat and immediately drying it so that the cutting, stacking, hanging and treatment in the drying lofts and the necessary expense incident thereto may be completely avoided, permitting the paper to be wound'into rolls of finished paperwhich is the most convenient and economical manner of handling it.

My improved'process covers also treating the paper immediately upon its exit from the wet end 2 of the paper machine whether or not it is later sized.

For purposes of illustration I have shown in Fig. 3 the same wet end 2 of the paper machine and have shown one form of my apparatus, whereby my improved method can be carried out, used in place of the drying drums 6, 6, which, as I have previously stated, are often as many as thirty in a machine. The paper. 1 after being treated by my improved process may either thenbe sized in the sizing vat 7 passing over the feed roll 9, 9 and thence again treated by my method or if the paper is not to be sized, the vat 7 and the duplication of my apparatus shown in Fig. 3 may be omitted, the web 1 being taken at the point 11 and rolled into rolls of finished aper.

My invention consists broadly in drying paper, and particularly high grade paper, atsuch a low temperature as not to afi'ect its quality. Further, to so dry it that the complete operation through the paper machine and drying apparatus will be continuous.

Various forms of apparatus may be used to carry out my improved method. One such form of apparatus is shown on a large scale in Fig. 1 and on a reduced scale in Figs. 2 and 3, the latter figure showing two of my forms of apparatus operating on the paper at different portions of its travel.

I employ a. vacuum chamber 12 which, in

the form shown in Pig. 1, consists of a cup 13 having a hollow body member 14 and a liquid container 15. Inverted and mounted over this body member 14 is a telescopic member 16. The interior chamber 17 formed by the body member 11 and the upperportion ofthe telescopic member 16 is partially exhausted by being connected to the pipe 18 which in turn is connected to a vacuum pump or barometric condenser (not shown).

\Vithin the liquid container 15 I place a suitable medium which will properly seal the vacuum chamber 17 and which will not have a deleterious efiect upon either the wet or dry paper as it is fed in and passes out. One sealing medium which I have found to be satisfactory, but to which my invention is not to be limited, is mercury 19. The web 1 of wet paper is fed around guide roll 20 and through the sealing medium 19, around the guide roll 21 and up between the walls of the body member 14 and the telescopic member 16 and into the vacuum chamber 17, around the guide rolls 22, 22 and 23, 23 and out around the guide rolls 2-l and the guide roll 25.

The vacuum chamber is heated in any suitable manner such for example as by heating the sealing medium by steam coils 26. The vacuum pump or barometric condenser is operated to obtain a partial vacuum in the vacuum chamber 17 sufiicient to insure the moisture in the wet paper being driven off at a temperature below 212 F. Of course the vacuummay be varied in wide limits. A vacuum of, about 26 inches of mercury will give a boiling point of about 126 F. The wet paper 1 passing through the sealing medium 19 and into the vacuum chamber will be completely dried at this low temperature, the moisture being taken ofi by the vacuum pump orbarometric condenser. In this manner I finish the paper, even paper of the highest quality, at such a relatively low temperature that its quality is not impaired.

Vhen my improved vacuum chamber is used as shown in Fig. 2, the paper, even of the highest quality, is immediately finished and dried the moment it passes through the vacuum chamber 12 and can be immediately wound into rolls of finished paper. This does away with the necessity of cutting it into sheets and the expense and delay of forty-eight hours in treating the sheets, usually 20 on a pole in the drying lofts. The mercury has also an ironing or finishing effect upon the paper.

\Vhen my improved Vacuum chamber 12 is used as in Fig. 3 it avoids the necessity of having a large number of steam heated drums which are shown diagrammatically in Fig. 4 and there numbered 6, 6. If the paper is not to be sized the sizing vat 7 and the second vacuum chamber 12 may be omitted and the paper taken from the point 11,

for example, and rolled into rolls of finished paper.

Wherever I have mentioned in my specification and claims of taking a web of wet paper from the paper machine I mean either after the paper has been 'sizedas in Fig. 2, or directly from the wet end of the paper machine as in Fig. 3. In this Fig. 3, to save a multiplicity of figures, I have shown the web 1 after being dried by the first. vacuum chamber 12, subsequently passing to the sizing vat 7 and then again dried. The point 11, in Fig. 3, indicates the point where the web may be rolled directly into rolls of finished unsized paper. I

I have for purposes of description shown my invention in connection with a paper making machine with which it is particularly adapted to beused. It is to be understood, however, that my invention can also be used to dry a web of wet fabric such as cotton from a bleaching vat or dye vat.

Having thus described my invention in connection with an illustrative embodiment of one form of my apparatus which is adapted to carry out my improved process, but to the details of which I do not desire to be limited, what is claimed as new and what it is desired to secure by Letters Patent is set forth in the appended claims.

1. The method of drying sheet.material consisting in passing a wet uncoated sheet material into a vacuum chamber through a liquid sealing medium which has no affinity for said sheet material, subjecting the vacuum chamber to heat to drive off the moisture in the incoated sheet of material, and passing the sheet of material from the vacuum chamber out through said liquid sealing medium.

2. The method ofrdrying sheet material consisting in passing a wet uncoated sheet material into a vacuum chamber through a liquid sealing medium which has no affinity for said sheet material, subjecting the vacum chamber to heat below 212 F. to drive off the moisture in the sheet material, and passing the sheet material from the vacuum chamber out through said liquid sealing medium.

3. The method of drying sheet material consisting in passing the wet sheet material into a vacuum chamber through a mercury seal, subjecting the wet sheet material while in the vacuum chamber to heat to drive 05 its contained moisture, and passing the sheet material out through the seal of merciiry.

a. The improvement in the art of making paper which consists in taking the wet sheet 01": paper from the paper making machine, passing it into a vacuum chamber through a liquid sealing medium which has no afiinity for said paper, subjecting the sheet of paper while in the vacuum chamber to heat between about 120 F. and 211 F.'to drive 0d its contained moisture, and passing it out from of paper from the paper'making machine,'

passing it into a vacuum chamber through a mercury seal, subjecting the sheet of paper while in the vacuum chamber to heat to drive off its contained moisture and passing it out from the vacuum chamber through the mercury seal.

6.'An apparatus for drying sheet material comprising a cup shaped member, a hollow body member, a hollow telescoping member fitting over the hollow body member, a liquid seal in the cup shaped member and means to form a partial vacuum in the hollow body member.

7. An apparatus for drying sheet material comprising a cup shaped member, a hollow body member,a hollow telescoping member fitting over the hollow body member, a liquid seal in the cup shaped member and means to form a partial vacuum in the hollow body member and means to heat said apparatus.

7 8. An apparatus for drying sheet material comprising a cup shaped member, a hollow body member, a hollow telescoping member fitting over the hollow body member, a liquid Y seal in the cup shaped member and means to form a partial vacuum in the hollow body member and means to heat said liquid seal.

OGDEN MINTON.

Witnesses:

LoU1sA LonHR, ALAN M. JOHNSON. 

